


Plaguebent

by pharmakon



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternia, Alternia-Focused, Fan Adventure, Humans In Troll Romances (Homestuck), Humans on Alternia, Jujus (Homestuck), Multi, Post-Apocalypse, SBURB Fan Session, Timeline Confusion, Troll Romance (Homestuck), a ridiculous amount of OCs, look what I found in Google docs
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-09-19
Updated: 2018-09-25
Packaged: 2019-07-14 10:07:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 6,342
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16038263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pharmakon/pseuds/pharmakon
Summary: A group of kids from different planets are plagued by mysterious gods and even more mysterious powers. There's something they're forgetting, but they can't think about that now.The apocalypse is a little bit more pressing.





	1. Jess--> Walk to school.

**Author's Note:**

> So I found a bunch of chapters for this in my Google docs from last year. It's basically writing practice with a ton of OC's set in a Homestuck universe, but I thought it wasn't actually too bad, and when I read through it I wanted to continue it. So, I'm going to-- after all, you can never have too much practice writing.
> 
> From what I remember, it's a ridiculously long/complicated Homestuck fan adventure that was kind of cryptic at the beginning but had a fully-fledged backstory. I'm pretty sure I had too much time on my hands last year. 
> 
> Feel free to leave comments or whatever if you're reading/you want to-- it'd be nice to see other people's reactions to what I wrote last spring.

No one else is out on the streets this early, so you walk to school alone. There's a surgical mask over your nose and mouth, a mosaic of scrapes and bruises along your arms and legs, and a wary bounce to your step. Now that the quarantine over your neighborhood's been lifted things are supposed to get better, but you aren't going to let your optimism get ahead of you. If anyone tries to jump you, they'll get a metal bat to the face and deserve it.

Still, it'll be nice to see your friends again.

Above you dawn flushes the clouds creamsicle pink-orange, and with it comes the heady, bitter smell of government fungicides. You pass a few abandoned houses, yellow tape waving in the chilly morning breeze, and an old church with a sign out front telling people to wash their hands for Jesus. A few bird calls puncture the silence. The only other sound is the crackle of your shoes on the worn-out street, and, faintly in the distance--

"Hey!" A figure, waving. You relax as soon as you recognize the shape of his hair: he isn't a threat, except maybe to your sanity. Gabe, your nemesis since middle school and your ex-boyfriend since 9th grade, jogs toward you with a smug tilt to his smile. "Jess!" he says as soon as he's close enough. "And here I thought you'd be dead."

"Gabe!" you mimic with a challenging grin. "And here I thought you'd be in prison. Did you outrun the cops or just bribe them?"

Gabe sighs at your ignorance, and you take a moment to catalogue the changes of three months. _There_ , in the bags under his eyes, and _there_ , in the messiness of his usually-sleek black hair, and _there_ in the thinness of his cheeks. Since all of Seattle shut down everyone had had to make do, and it looks like he had to scramble more than most. Yet he stands like he could take an army. It almost makes you like him.

"Oh ye of little faith," he says. "I _outsmarted_ them. I understand it's a new idea for you."

"That's true, I'd never dream _you_ could outsmart anyone. Gonna tell me how you managed it? Unless you think I'd snitch." You would never. Not because Gabe's a particular friend of yours, because he isn't, but because you have a policy of being loyal to all your friends. And Gabe, whatever he is, is probably at least a friend.

Barely.

Gabe makes a show of modesty, looking down and away, bringing a faint blush to his cheeks. If you didn't know him better you wouldn't catch the ugly, satisfied glint in his eyes. "It was nothing, really," he says slowly, and in his voice you hear the faintest shadow of a gloat. "It's just... they were so _eager_ to catch their favorite vandal, so quick on their feet, and you know how good I am at finding paths no one else can follow." He shrugs. "They just took a wrong turn."

Your insides turn to ice, and yet behind that is a flicker of pride. Of course the police couldn't catch Gabe. He could out-psycho _anyone_. He can take care of himself, he always has. "You trapped them in quarantine," you say, unable to hide a sliver of admiration past your disgust. Of _course_ he did. There aren't many survivors in your neighborhood past the lucky and the immune, too, and you're one of the latter. You would have heard of some cops running around and causing trouble. Your heart goes heavy and slow in your chest as you say, "You realize they're dead, right." It's not a question.

Gabe blinks, the picture of innocence. "And your point is...?"

You try not to be sick. "Let's just never mention this again."

The boy smiles. It isn't a nice expression. You're reminded of the serial killers you used to see on TV, on documentaries, in interviews, pale men with calm faces, describing how they dissected people alive. That's what you have to look forward to, with Gabe. Why do you keep him around, again?

"Mention what, Jessie? How they must have died? I heard the plague goes for the lungs first, is that true? Coats them white until you cough up spores, gets into your blood till your skin is chalk, and then it reaches your brain and shuts it down. I heard it's torture. That people scream as the fungus rots them from the inside out. Really," he bites out, and his voice is infuriatingly smug, atrocities pouring from his tongue like he relishes the taste, "it's all they deserved, isn't it?"

You snarl and try not to reach for your bat. "They were just doing their jobs. You _bastard_."

Gabe shrugs, and then he goes still, like a cat who just spotted a bird. Predatory. Sadistic. "Hey, Jessie, you know I'm all about doing my research. So tell me, in the name of science-- did your _parents_ scream like that?"

You go still. There's a howling rising in your ears. You know that he's trying to provoke you, that he doesn't really empathize well, that he probably considers this casual banter-- but your hands are shaking. But you're tense, pale with rage, and Gabe's starting to falter...

You throw a punch and it connects. You throw another and he dodges and _that's not acceptable, how dare he_ and Gabe shoves you, hard. And then you're fighting in the middle of the street, pulling hair and not pulling punches, like you're six again and he just called you a prissy girl.

It's thrilling. It's terrible, and weird, even weirder somehow than when you were dating and _didn't_ fight because someone would see you scuffling and think it was abuse, and you wouldn't admit it under torture but you _missed_ this, missed _him_ , more than anyone. You don't know who you'd be without Gabe to measure up against every step of the way.

Gabe gives you a black eye and you split his lip. He goes for your ribs and you dance back, laughing like a wild thing, and neither of you even thinks of going easy on the other. You fall in like you never dated, never separated, never did anything but push and pull and pit yourselves against each other, like you're little again and daring each other to make the first blow. Everything goes vague with exhilarated hatred.

At some indeterminable point you stand up and he stays down and all the fight falls out of you. You reach out a hand to help him up and pretend your eyes aren't stinging. "You asshole. Don't ever say that about my parents again."

He takes your hand and winces theatrically. "Fine, fine. Three months and you still pack a punch, Jessie. It's just like when we were dating."

"You and I remember our relationship _very_ differently," you say as you help him up. Your entire body hurts, but the adrenaline rush was worth it. Your hair is falling in loose chestnut clumps around your face. You're gonna have to redo your ponytail, but there's nothing you can do about the new collection of scrapes and bruises you'll be sporting after this reckless little scuffle. "You okay, Gabe?" Still. School will just have to deal.

"Fine." He pauses, then adds, "You?"

You throw him a real smile. "Peachy. But seriously, never mention my parents again."

"Touchy!" he declared with a hand to his chest. "But sure. I know when I've gone too far."

"Like hell you do," you say, and then you both brush off your clothes. It occurs to you that he could only have come out this far to meet you, to see if you were coming, to see if you were even alive. You push the revelation out of your mind with the force of a bulldozer. "Why aren't you wearing a mask, you idiot?"

"You know they don't really help. Anything short of a gas mask is like tissue paper to these things." His lip is split and bleeding. You spend longer staring at it than you might like to admit. "Come on, Jessie. We're gonna be late." He rolls his eyes. "Maybe I should've lured Principal Becker like I did those cops."

You glare at him. "Yeah, how about no."

"Whatever. Like anyone would miss that old bastard anyway." You ignore him with the ease of long practice.

"And," you add as you remember, "I am never late. I haven't been late anywhere, ever, since 9th grade." And you're proud of it, too.

The two of you walk in prickly peace for a few minutes, and Gabe fills you in on all the recent gossip. Dianna Knightly finally came out of the closet (good job, you know she was shy), Josh Brown found out his dad died a year ago in Stockholm (you wince in painful sympathy), Will Thanos got his sylladex working again--

"Wait, wait," you interrupt, ignoring Gabe's poisonous glare like a champ. "Sylladex, like the digital reality storage system? _Our_ Will did that? I knew he was good with tech, but--"

"--Lucy's the genius, I know." Gabe actually smiles a little with pride. His little sister is the one weak spot of his you'll never exploit. "But he got it to work. Pulled out a washing machine and everything."

"Bet the teachers liked _that_."

"We haven't done _shit_ for six months, they were just glad no one brought a knife that week," Gave says. "Yeah, I thought sylladexes went away with Skaia Labs. Guess I better dig mine out again."

"Yeah..." Another thought crosses your mind. "Any word from Milo?"

Gabe goes quiet. "No," he says after a long moment. "None."

You think he might be about to say something more for a second, but instead he freezes. You hear it too: loud barks and growls, and above them a voice shrieking panicky curses. If you walk on the feral dogs probably won't notice you, you'll be fine, but. No. That's not really an option.

You run toward the noise instead, trusting Gabe to follow you. A few blocks away the whole bloody scene comes into view.

At first sight your heart almost stops. It isn't the six dogs surrounding their victim with murder in their eyes, or the blood already streaming from the tall girl's calf, or the bloodied piece of pipe the girl is swinging like she was born to it. It's the white on her face: white like rotting, like sickness and suffocation and death thick and monstrous in the air, like spore dust that can so easily be tracked into a house and kill your father and devour your mother from the inside out as she screams and screams, and you're sorry, you're _so so sorry_ , but it's not enough, it won't bring them _back--_

Gabe digs his fingernails into your arm. His face is pale as bone. "Paint. It's paint, you moron," he grits out, and you breathe, take long slow breaths until your chest loosens up again. You watch the fight hazily, just for a second, thanking God that the dogs haven't noticed you yet, and yeah. That is just paint. God knows why it's on her face.

You'd better help if that's what you're here for, though. You pull out your bat from your backpack, Gabe tugs a crowbar from his, and you shout, "Hey! Hey, _pinches perros_ , get over here! Come at me!"

Three of the dogs halt and turn to see you. The painted girl brains one of them while it's distracted, but two more rush at you and Gabe. You take a moment to regret the fight you got into half an hour ago and spread your feet in preparation. Then the dogs are on you like an angry, biting hurricane.

You swing your bat and knock one aside, kick at another with your steel-toed boots, but a third takes their place and sinks its vicious teeth into your leg. A bolt of hot agony rips through your thigh and you scream, the sound barely reaching your ears. Gabe slams the dog off you, and you spin to cover his back.

Your ex shouts in sudden pain, and you kick the leader of the pack, big and black like an omen of death, back a few feet. Gabe's clutching his hand, streaming red and gasping, and he's dropped his weapon. You toss it back to him and turn just in time to fend off a monster of a dog from tearing through your hamstrings. How much longer can you keep this up? You don't know, but you're prepared to find out.

Somewhere in the chaos the tall girl joins you, shrieking like a madwoman, and between the three of you you finally manage to scare the pack away.

You stand still then, panting with adrenaline, and Gabe steadies you with a reluctant hand. From somewhere deep within you, untouched by the apocalypse and the crumbling of modern civilization, you dredge up a grin. "Hi! I'm Jess, this is Gabe. You're a good fighter, you live here?" She doesn't live here, you don't think, but you can't be sure. You haven't met _everyone_ in the area, and where else would she even come from?

"Haha, no, I'm just, I'm passing through. I guess I owe you nice motherfuckers for helping me out there, that was all kinds of sweet of you. I'm, I'm Mel." She laughs again, breathy and rough, and you wonder how much blood she's lost. Good thing she looks about your age; you're gonna need the nurse's office at school for first aid at _least_. Maybe they'll even have rabies shots.

"It's nice to meet you, Mel," Gabe says in his _trust me, I'm so charming_ voice. He's unusually cautious when he asks, "You hit your head or something? Need any help?"

"I, uh, just don't know how I came to being here, all fleshy brown and bare-faced and without, without no..." she trails off, sways, eyes going unfocused. You catch her (oof, she's heavy) before she hits the ground. Gabe looks at both of you with disgust.

"Really?" he asks, all semblance of niceness gone. "You're really doing this."

You flip him off with your free hand and adjust your grip. "Really," you tell him. "And by the way, you were right. We're gonna be _so_ late."


	2. Lucy--> Be the first responder, it is you

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Was this, at the time, incredibly silly/self-indulgent? Yes, yes it was.
> 
> Am I bothered by that? No, no I'm not.

 You don't know what's taking your brother so long, but if it takes any more you're going to bounce your leg clean off. School is in session, the teachers are looking stressed and tired and sweaty with fear behind all the coffee, and you're wondering if taking down the quarantine maybe wasn't such a good idea. There's no guarantee that anyone's left alive in that side of town, anyway, though it would be really nice if some had survived. Maybe if Jess did Gabe will stop moping so much and pretending he's just brooding in the most manly and menacing of ways.

Really, you don't understand him sometimes. It wasn't even that good of a ploy to lure those policemen into quarantine like that. It was mean, and probably lethal, and you'd yelled at Gabe for _hours_ after he told you, but it wasn't exactly creative. If you were doing it, which you would never because you have morals, you would have disposed of them more thoroughly. Loose ends aren't any better in real life than they are in code.

But you aren't Gabe, and things played out as they did, and so you're waiting in the back of your History class with one hand twirling your hair to sad blonde bits and the other tapping a nervous rhythm on your desk. The girl ahead of you turns back and glares; you stop, sheepishly, then twitch a little and ask, "May I be excused?"

The teacher, a sub you can't really remember the name of, waves you off with a grimace. Poor man. He's scared to bits of all of you, and barely older than the seniors. The school district was scraping the bottom of the barrel for this one.

You can understand that, though. Most of their more qualified employees are dead.

The nurse's office is a second home to you, now. You have a cot set up in the corner with a princess-themed sleeping bag just for you, since your home got burned down by looters. You have a phone charger, not that it's much use to you right now. You even have a job, since the hospitals were hit hardest and your neighborhood was hit harder.

As a matter of fact, you're the only person with any real medical knowledge in the area, thanks to an internship you did with your mom’s company.

So you aren't surprised, really, when your friend Will appears at the office door and says, "Patients incoming."

"Anyone we know?" you ask. It doesn't matter; you'd treat them just as well regardless of familiarity. But it's nice to know, sometimes. It's a little way to make sure that the people you love are safe. If they're coming to you, then they're alive and probably uncontaminated, and you can help.

You're very tired of not being able to help.

Will perks up a little, his usual gravitas falling away like water. "Jess. With Gabe, of course. And some girl I don't know. Her face is all white, but it's just paint."

You wince. "Ooh, that's not gonna look good."

"I'll bring them a few wipes to wash it off," Will offers, and you smile. He always looks so grave and serious, and then you talk to him and he's a sweetheart. You're glad the two of you got the sylladex working; it means you can keep being in cahoots without it feeling like a waste of time.

"Thanks, Will!" you chirp. "And bring a few of those maggots we've got lying around? Hannah told me her brother's gotten injured in a gunfight, and I think we'll need to clear out the necrotic tissue before he gets gangrene or something."

Will brings up a dark hand in languid salute. "Will do, Luce. Be sure to move slow with the new arrivals. We don't know the new kid and she seems kinda jumpy."

"You don't have to tell _me_ twice."

"Good, then I won't," your friend says, and he leaves. You take a moment to admire how he walks heel-to-toe, making his steps silent like a cat's, and then you refocus on the task at hand.

You are the first responder, and the last line of defense between your neighborhood and death. It's a big responsibility-- one your parents wouldn't approve of for sure-- but your parents are overseas and you're right here, and you don't really care what they think.

You are the hospital, it is you.

And here, arguing all the way down the hallway as they tramp through your door, are your patients.

Jess grins to see you through a mouth of bloody teeth. "Hey, Lucy!"

You don't waste time with frivolities; you run up and throw your arms around her, checking as you do for how she winces and moves. A lot of bruises, a bite on her leg-- do you still have rabies shots? Yeah, but they might be expired-- and a number of cuts and bloody scrapes. She's thinner, too, lean with hunger and whipcord-muscled. "I've missed you a lot," you say, overcome with horror at the state of the world and relief that your friend is here, and safe, where you can help. "I'm gonna get you patched up, okay? Sit down. Doctor's orders. You too, Gabe, and you, uh..."

The girl next to your brother has brown skin and messy black hair, and she's wiping her face with a wet wipe. When she pulls it away you see hints of white on her face and can't help but grimace. It's paint, obviously, but it sends a pang of sympathetic fear through you. "Mel," your brother volunteers. He glares sullenly at Jess, which is how you know who won their latest fight. Huh, so that's still going on. You're not really surprised.

"It's nice to meet you, Mel," you say politely. "I'm Lucy, I'm the acting school nurse. Can I look at you?"

Mel squints. "Thought you already were, medisister. Unless you mean where I'm all wounded and such?"

Gabe snarks, "Obviously," and Jess stomps on his foot. You frown, push Gabe down to sit next to Jess on your cot, and flick both hard on the foreheads.

"Stop that," you say, and to Mel, "and you sit down! There's a table there, park your butt on it and wait."

The new girl's blushing for some reason. You have no idea why. "What happened?"

"Plastic bags," Jess says at the same time Gabe says, "Feral dogs."

You giggle. "Government propaganda's gotten to you! Show me your bites, I wanna see how bad."

They are pretty bad. Didn't get any major tendons or anything, but they're still bleeding through the makeshift bandages Jess put on at the expense of her camisole. You poke around Mel's wounds the longest, noting the blood loss and the griminess of her skin, and hope to God and heaven that she doesn't get some sort of infection. A plague outbreak-- or anything else, really-- is the last thing you need.

"You're in luck!" you declare as you stand up. "I've still got rabies shots in the mini fridge. You're gonna have to get me more after this, Gee, I'm almost out."

Gabe shrugs, which means he'll do it but he'll also complain a lot. Jess says, "Thanks," like she means it, which is nice. You smile at her.

"Mel, you first." You get out the shots and prepare them, trying to remember everything your very brief hospital internship taught you. Disinfect the area first, make sure everything's sterile... "Do you wanna bite down on something or squeeze a stress ball? This is gonna hurt."

Mel blinks at you slowly. "I'm alright," she says, mouth creeping up into a smile. "I got knowledge of pain, I handle it okay." When you take a towel and wipe the grime off her wounds she blushes dark as night.

"Did she hit her head?" you mouth at Gabe when your patient looks away. He frowns and shakes his head (okay, that's a maybe), then shrugs. Such help, much wow.

"If you say so," you tell Mel a little dubiously, and then you slide the needle into her leg. She keeps her word and stays quiet through the whole series of injections. "Good job, you did good," you say once she's done, which makes her blush again. You start to wonder if she has a condition or something. "I'll fix you up more in a sec. Jess, you next, then you, Gee."

" _Gee_ ," Jess snickers. Gabe elbows her and she scoots back, laughing, before shoving him halfway off the cot.

This will be an entertaining day. You can already tell.

\---

You finish up with your friends and Mel, who seems perfectly happy to prattle along about one thing or another until you mention music, when she becomes deliriously happy to prattle along. It's cute. You want to keep talking to her and see if you can make her smile more. She has a sweet face; she looks like she's made for smiling.

Jess takes her mask off after she gets her shots, and then she hangs around the office for the rest of the day, fetching and chatting, even when Gabe goes back to class. You learn that her aunt is alive and well, which is good.

You also learn that her parents are dead. That... isn't.

It's alright, though. You can help Jess, even if you can't help her family, and she knows you won't tell Gabe that she cried. You'll tell him that you did, which is also true, and he won't dare make fun of _you_  for it.

When the day winds to a close you put away everything you need to put away and pull out your old laptop. You hadn't touched it in a year, up until a week ago. But now, with Will's help, you've gotten it working again, and you have to keep up your side of a bargain.

alleviAlchemist [AA] is bothering headHoncho [HH]!

AA: Dad? Are you there??

HH: Dearest.

HH: You were supposed to check in an hour ago.

HH: How can I trust you if you can't keep your word for such a simple thing? I was worried.

AA: I had patients, sorry

AA: You know how it is, people need me, I can't let them down!

HH: You shouldn't be doing that kind of work at your age. It's disgraceful, is what it is. There isn't a single doctor in the area? 

HH: Where are the adults who are supposed to be protecting you?

AA: Well, right now they're both in Switzerland, DAD.

HH: Lucy

AA: What do you want from me? I've been checking in since I got my connection back 

HH: I want you to be calm and collected, like I raised you to be.

HH: You know your mother and I would come back if we were able

HH: But the company needs us here, and even people of our influence can't always secure flights back to the USA. Until containment and decontamination is complete, international travel is too much of a risk.

AA: Dad, I know all that!

AA: I've been reporting on conditions and quarantine statuses and everything 

AA: But you said you "can't always" secure. That the "company" needs you. Your family needs you too, you know.

AA: I've been sleeping at my school for the past month 

AA: I've been treating people with septic shock, with pregnancy complications, even with arthritis, and I'm not trained for any of that! I'm barely trained at all! But I'm the only one left after that big outbreak at the hospital, and no one can afford to travel to get any better care 

AA: Things are bad here, Dad, and I know you could help

AA: and I

AA: I just found out one of my best friends' parents are dead! And you know what? That made me miss my parents, and

HH: Lucy, listen to me.

AA: and they aren't here!!! Don't tell me to listen, you never listen to me,

AA: you just talk and talk and talk and it's always stocks or this company or

AA: OH NO, EMPLOYEES ARE DYING? DEMANDING BETTER TREATMENT? UNIONIZING?

AA: TIME TO CALL IN RIOT CONTROL! Maybe if you pepper spray enough people they'll stop noticing all the price gouging you do on medications that SAVE LIVES

HH: Lucy, you're too old for tantrums. Calm down.

AA: sure

AA: whatever

AA: sorry, dad

HH: Is everything alright with you and Gabe?

AA: I'm hungry and most of the people I know are dead

AA: Can't you send more fungicides over to the USA? And antifungals, everyone needs those

AA: If you aren't in a major population area the government doesn't care so much

AA: Not enough resources, I guess

AA: It makes me sad to think about it

HH: As you grow up you'll grow a thicker skin. It's alright to be sad now. You're young. All the youth are over-affected by the world.

AA: Even when the world's trying to kill us???

HH: Lucy, it does no good to get hysterical. What do I always say?

AA: Never lend a gambling addict money?

HH: The other thing, Lucy.

AA: Bare your throat and the world will tear it out.

HH: There's my little prodigy.

HH: I've got to go. Contact me on time tomorrow, understand? Punctuality is the politeness of princes.

AA: Okay

AA: Love you, Daddy

HH: I love you too, sweetheart.

HH: And your mother sends her regards.

headHoncho [HH] stopped bothering alleviAlchemist [AA]!

You blink back tears. It's only been a week since you and Will got Botherbuddy working again, at least in your area, and you're wondering if you're gonna start regretting it.

You love your dad. He carried you on his shoulders when you were little, brought you your favorite toys when you got sick when you were five and had to stay in the hospital for a week, used to kiss you goodnight until you were ten. But you can't always agree with him, and sometimes it feels like you're arguing over a canyon too wide to cross. Like you used to be together on Pangaea, but now the tectonic plates are moving and you're pulling steadily apart.

It's not fun being the favored child. Every expectation adds another fifty pounds, until your parents crush you beneath their weight.

It hurts, sometimes, but you have to be brave. People depend on you. Your brother does too, even if he won't admit it.

"Goodnight, Gabe," you whisper to an empty room. Gabe's out hunting for more supplies. You think Will took Mel back to stay at his place, too, so you're the only one except for some of the teachers who's staying at the school. Hopefully the new girl won't turn out to be secretly evil or something.

Will can take her in a fight, though, so that's okay. Probably. You banish the thought from your mind.

You curl up on your cot instead, shifting as it creaks and settles, and pull the rim of the sleeping bag up to your chin.

Sleep is important. People are depending on you, and without you they'll have no one to turn to. Insomnia is for people with less responsibilities, so you close your eyes and will yourself to dream.

The faint hoots of an owl outside the school walls sing you to sleep.


	3. Gabe --> Have incredibly dubious morality

Night has fallen on the worst neighborhood still out of quarantine, and you are strolling along, singing without a care in the world.

_ It's a marshmallow world in the winter _

_ When the snow comes to cover the ground _

_ It's the time for play, it's the whipped cream day-- _

You hear the faint crunch of footsteps behind you and hold back a smirk. Didn't take them long to take the bait, did it?

_ I wait for it the whole year round... _

"Hey, kid!" your follower calls. He has a hoarse voice. Uncultured, probably also unbathed. Not that you care; if he was the cleanest, most sophisticated and law-abiding citizen you knew you'd still go after him. Can't make an omelet without breaking a few kneecaps.

You pretend to startle at the sound, spinning around with your face in a mask of fear.

"Uh, hey," you fake-babble. "Sorry, is this your territory? I can go..." Your voice is high and frightened, painting the picture of a scared, lost, privileged kid.  _ Look at me, I'm so helpless. I'm no threat. _

Ha.

The man smiles in a way he probably thinks is menacing. It's insulting, more than anything. You have more menace in your pinkie finger than this bozo does in his entire body. He just doesn't know it yet. "Leaving so soon? You're already out past curfew, kid. You're in trouble as it is."

That's just fine for you, that he doesn't know who he's messing with. A crocodile can hardly complain when some poor deer mistakes it for a log. "It's past curfew?" you stutter, keeping an eye on your surroundings. The guy's alone; good, that makes your job much easier. He's stupid, too; that makes it easier still.

"I'll tell you what," the man says. "I won't tell... so long as you give me all the money you've got on you."

Ah, so he's incredibly stupid. You count everything wrong with what he just said, starting with the fact that he could just as easily be reported himself for being out past curfew, and ending with the fact that since the quarantines went down the curfew isn't even in effect anymore. The streets are only empty because human beings are too dumb to process change.

None of that changes how scared you pretend to be. "Don't report me!" you squeak, and are absurdly annoyed when your voice actually cracks. You back up, darkly pleased to see how he follows you.

"Just show me what you've got on you," your prey says, and then he lunges to grab your arm.

He probably expects you to try to dodge, or try to hit him, or try to run away. He expects you to be the prey instead of the predator, the log instead of the crocodile.

It's a shame he can't see what's right in front of him.

You sidestep neatly and trap his arm between yours, snap his arm at the elbow. He screams, high and hoarse-- that's all right, no one'll come to investigate in  _ this _ part of town- and you drop him to the ground like a slab of meat.

Your sylladex is working again, thanks to your sister and Will, and you're glad of it now. You equip your crowbar and grin down at your would-be robber. "I've got  _ this  _ on me," you tell him, and then you slam it down on his right kneecap.

He screams again-- honestly, can't he do anything else? It's so boring-- and tries to drag himself back from you with only one arm. The other flops limply at his side. It's a clean break. You're proud of it; the technique took a while to perfect.

You wait until he stops screaming and starts whimpering and babbling before you ask, "This is your gang's territory?" He nods. "Where's your med stash?"

"What the fuck, man, fuck, my leg, I wouldn't've done this to  _ you-- _ "

"What does that matter?" you ask, honestly curious.

"Fuck you--" He won't answer your original question.You shatter another kneecap, wait out his screams again, and repeat the question.

An abandoned apartment building across town, he says, third room from the elevator on the fourth floor. His gang will kill you, they'll come after you, you won't even make it that far--

You knock him out and leave. You would kill him, but Lucy might disapprove.

You're disappointed, really. This is supposed to be the bad part of town, where all the worst criminals live. You were expecting a challenge.  _ Jess _ certainly wouldn't have fallen for that little trick of yours. She would have put up a fight, maybe beaten you, and it would have been  _ interesting _ .

Of course, you wouldn't have broken Jess's arm even if you did see the chance. It would make your life less fun: you'd have to wait for her to heal, and she'd be vicious as a wildcat in the next fight, and you aren't interested in getting any of  _ your _ bones broken. Plus, Lucy would tear you a new one for it, and Will would be furious, and Milo (wherever he is) would be disappointed...

It wouldn't be worth it. But you're willing to bet that your ex-girlfriend could organize a better gang than whoever leads this pack of morons.

Third room, fourth floor, he said. You doubt the elevator still works, so once you reach the building you climb the stairs.

You haven't ruled out the possibility of the man lying, of course, but you're good at reading people. You're pretty sure he was telling the truth.

You keep your crowbar out, because if the stash doesn't have a guard these gang members are too stupid to live. Really, you'd be doing the world a favor at that point by taking their supplies.

There  _ is  _ a guard, and he has a gun. He stands up from his slump against the wall and glares, tries to talk like he knows what he's doing. "Hey! What are you doing here?"

"I'm a new recruit," you tell him. In the back of your head Lucy is yelling at you for killing those policemen. A more peaceful approach, then. It's an interesting challenge, you suppose. "Didn't you hear? I'm Leon, from a few blocks over."

"Nobody lives a few blocks over," the guard says, eyes going down to your bloody crowbar, and that's enough of being peaceful. You bring your weapon up in an arc toward his face, and he dodges, faster than you thought, and punches you in the face. You stagger back and he hits you again-- and again-- before you get away. He's stronger than you thought, and you're thin from rationing food, lean and mean but still in a sixteen-year-old's body, for all that you detest how people underestimate you for it. He slams you against the wall and goes for the gun at his waist--

You bare your teeth and bring all of your rage to a white-hot focus, and then you look at the wall in front of you.

You imagine, in one split second, throwing a red ball at the wall. It bounces back, in your head; you throw it again, pressing all your thoughts into change, into hurting this fucking guard who's keeping you from what you want, and this time the daydream goes on bouncing, and whenever it reaches a solid surface the wall folds back into another room. Infinity, any number of dimensions, unknowable. Space without end, and for a few moments it's at your beck and call.

You gather your strength and shove the guard into the wall, and he falls through and keeps falling, wall after wall unfolding under his weight, until his body is a pinpoint in the darkness, and then you can't see it at all.

The wall goes solid again at a touch of your hand.

You are alone in the hallway, and the door to the stash is unlocked.

_ Ha _ . Like anyone in this gang of idiots could have kept you from your goals.

Like they could ever have beaten  _ you. _

_ The world is a snowball, see how it grows _

_ That's how it grows, whenever it snows... _

You stroll into the room and keep on singing.


End file.
